


awake at night

by ironiccowboykink



Category: Carmen Sandiego (Cartoon 2019), Carmen Sandiego (Netflix)
Genre: Age gap? I guess, Amnesia, But chase is in angry lesbians, Carmen is bisexual, Chase is like 30 after all, F/F, F/M, Insomnia kind of, Julia says lesbian rights, Lesbians, Memory Loss, Messy headspace, Mystery girls, actual lesbians, everyone except for Julia is bi, graham sees a lot of flashing colors, inside his brain, internal epilepsy, julia is in lesbians with carmen, they are all in lesbians with carmen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-19
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2019-11-24 17:42:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18168179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironiccowboykink/pseuds/ironiccowboykink
Summary: Something ticks in his brain. Low and soft, low and sweet, Gray sings. “Black sheep, black sheep, have you any wool?”—“Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?” Julia asks, pressing a hand carefully to her heart.—“Ugh.” Chase slouches over the side of his bed, head hanging heavily in his hands.”Carmen Sandiego.”





	1. I Wanted You To Find Me

**Author's Note:**

> The CS fandom needs more fics

Gray lays sleepily awake, eyes blinking against the soft moonlight. He’s tired, unbelievably so; his body aches with phantom pain, and red won’t stop flashing behind his eyelids. The red of that Carmen, looking like something straight out of the play. Gray wonders.

“She stood me up,” he muses carefully. Gray guesses he overestimated how into him she was— she had seemed pretty receptive. Though, the look on her face before she somehow disappeared was odd.

She seemed… sad. And Gray couldn’t figure out why. Something tugs at the back of his head, the nape of his neck; something tells him it’s him, he’s the reason why she’s sad, and that there’s more. There’s more that he should know, and does know, but every time he thinks about it he gets this _blinding_ headache and—

Gray sits up with a sigh. He’s not going to sleep tonight.

He drags a hand over his face, cups his chin in his hand. If he keeps his mouth covered, all the secrets he doesn’t know can’t go spilling out like his guts. 

He shuffles his way to the kitchen, content to putz around aimlessly. There’s just enough light from the waning moon to navigate. His hands move without his input, mind lost deep in thought. Why would Carmen come to the date only to just abandon him? Is abandon even the right word? It sticks with him though, flits around inside his brain like a will o’ wisp. 

Abandoned. Deserted. Desert _er._ Leaving, going, gone, gone, gone, did Carmen leave was it her she was _gone_ and Gray remembers there was a _train_ —

Fuck. God, another headache.

Sighing, Gray clutches what he’s made. Takes a deep sniff. It’s hot chocolate. 

“I didn’t even know I had chocolate,” he mumbles petulantly, raising the steaming cup to his lips. He sinks down to the floor of his kitchen, back melding against the cold cabinet doors. His drink— it’s a deep, rich brown. The color, it reminds him of someone, of warmth, and a hand on his shoulder, and red, red lips, and lipstick stains, but he doesn’t— he can’t— it’s so _difficult—_

Gray basks in the warmth of the cup. It’s an oddly familiar smell for all its sugar. 

Something ticks in his brain. Low and soft, low and sweet, Gray sings. “Black sheep, black sheep, have you any wool?”

_Yes sir, yes sir; three bags full._

He frowns. The stress headache is coming back, but he doesn’t want to stop singing. It feels right, like something he has to do, like everything he’s missing will come together.

The silence of his apartment is truly deafening.

“Black sheep, black sheep, have you any wool?” Gray insists, watching the first brilliant rays of sunlight crest over the horizon. They stretch long and wild, creeping up upon his bare feet. The whole world flashes yellow as he sings— _”black sheep, black sheep, have you any wool?”_ — but Gray doesn’t mind the light. 

The whole world flashes yellow, and red, and green, and the pressure builds behind his eyelids, and he hears Carmen, and a young girl, and himself, and _”I know how an electromagnetic pulse works, Gray.” “Or should I call you black sheep?”_ and sighs and sighs and sighs, feeling sick to his stomach.

Gray lies sleepily awake, eyes blinking against the sharp sunlight. 

He takes a sip of his drink. It’s the color of a girl he used to know.


	2. Fever Dreaming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?” Julia asks, pressing a hand carefully to her heart. She already knows the answer to that question, it seems. She steeples her fingers deep in the silky fabric of her nightgown, feels her heart beat steady and proud, feels it squeeze and ache in the absence of a warm body behind her. If Julia closes her eyes, she can feel thick red hair tickle her nose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: some of my text was accidentally deleted. Went back and fixed the error.

Julia wraps herself deep in the comforts of her blankets, eyes shut to ward off the moonlight. A headache blooms between her eyes, another consequence of another sleepless night. She holds her sheets tighter, as if her iron-clad grip would keep her mind from wandering too far. 

After a few restless moments, her eyes fly open. It’s starting to require more effort keeping them closed than to just let them be.

A soft sigh rings out into the night. Julia may be getting used to not sleeping, but that doesn’t mean she’s happy about it.

She sighs again, much more forlornly this time, tracing circles into her comforter with a gentleness unknown. She’s painted them red— which, normally she would think is hilarious, her apparent subconscious fixation on Carmen Sandiego, but it stopped being subconscious when she was three feet away from the most beautiful woman on earth on the train, and now she wants to tuck her hands away so she stops imagining them on someone else’s skin. But she doesn’t; she likes imagining Carmen Sandiego, especially the most frequent dream where she slides in behind Julia to cuddle up against her back, tucking her chin up in the crook Julia’s shoulder and whispers how much she loves her.

“ _Merde,_ ” she whispers. Julia doesn’t even know anything about Carmen! Except that she’s strong, wily and cunning, and charming with her big, violet eyes, armed with a mysterious smile, and a beautiful voice, and a moral compass (if a bit untraditional about it), and—

Julia bites down on her tongue. It wouldn’t do any good, anyway. That entire dialogue was in her head. ”Merde,”she says again for good measure. She shivers into her covers. What would Chase say about this?

 _Probably something bigoted,_ she thinks, rolling her eyes. _La femme rouge!_

Her joke warms her heart, even as the chill of the night— and her loneliness — drive her deeper into her comforter. Chase. Yes, Chase is a delightful topic. A safe topic. Her eyes shut, and she contents herself to dream of her partner, of his brutish ways and sleepy face. She feels herself tiring already. How wonderful, Chase seems finally useful.

_La femme rouge…_

_La femme rouge…_

_La femme…_

Carmen.

Julia jolts awake, cursing to the sky. “Can’t I get a minute of sleep?” She whines, rubbing her temples. “One minute without Carmen Sandiego?” Dull pain blooms between her eyes and she sighs. Worrying herself sick over the mysterious Carmen Sandiego— is that her future? Every night, lying wide awake, dreaming with her eyes open?

“Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?” Julia asks, pressing a hand carefully to her heart. She already knows the answer to that question, it seems. She steeples her fingers deep in the silky fabric of her nightgown, feels her heart beat steady and proud, feels it squeeze and ache in the absence of a warm body behind her. If Julia closes her eyes, she can feel thick red hair tickle her nose.

The sun rises slowly over the horizon. Beams of light pierce her like bullets, and her headache only grows; Julia is resigned to her fate of longing. She closes her eyes again, finding a strange sort of peace in her discomfort— she resolves to get a least a single wink of sleep, even if she must ignore Chase’s incessant pestering to do it.

Though, it occurs to her, if Chase calls on the tail of her Carmen…

Well. Perhaps sleep is overrated. 

Stretch and yawn, prepare one's body for the day. She rises, shaking what little sleep she got out of her limbs. ” _Carpe diem,_ my dear Carmen,” she murmurs.

She picks up her phone, and dials one of the few numbers on it. “Chase?” She asks, and barely gives him time to respond before continuing. “Yes, it’s me. Julia. Let’s get to work early today. I have a feeling we’re going to find something.”

She hangs up. “Watch out, Carmen Sandiego,” Julia says to the rising sun. “I’m going to find you.”


	3. Let It Burn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ugh.” Chase slouches over the side of his bed, head hanging heavily in his hands. _”Carmen Sandiego.”_

“Ugh.” Chase slouches over the side of his bed, head hanging heavily in his hands. _”Carmen Sandiego.”_

Sludge pulses through his veins. He feels sickly and tired, though he supposes the alcohol has something to do with it.

Chase doesn’t usually drink, but tonight calls for it.

His kidnap weighs heavy on his mind. Rather hard to think about it now, really. Everything feels a bit fuzzy. It’s cuz he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to _think_. Memories of the cage around his head, of it scrambling his mind is too much. Of being trapped in his own body. Awake but not quite there. Police. The looks Miss Argent and Chief gave him…

Chase rakes his hand down his face. Though it’s more like he slaps his hand over his eyes and lets it rest there. The lights are dim, but to his eyes they’re blinding. He can’t be bothered to turn them off, though. Not when he’s got Carmen Sandiego on his mind.

Fear and anger well up in him, lash out at his soul like rats. She gave his terror a name. A color. Two shadowy forms for it to manifest. Not two, only one; she gave it a hat to wear, fists to bear, swords to swing. She gave it a hellish mix of black robes and mint-green hair and a red cloak. A square, lithe body. Dark hands. Pale skin. Meticulously trimmed nails. He sees them all, all three. A terrible Frankenstein that haunts him when he sleeps.

He shakes his head to clear the fog. It’s too terrible to think about.

Who is he to blame for this? Is there even anyone to blame?

Something akin to a sob escapes his mouth and Chase groans past his teeth, a terrible feeling welling up in his soul. It’s not supposed to be _scary._ Carmen Sandiego wasn’t scared— so why is Chase crying in his shitty apartment? Why can’t he go in the bathroom? Why has he bought a new tube of toothpaste and a toothbrush, why has he moved those new supplies to the kitchen sink?

It’s not fair. Nothing’s ever fair. Chase shouldn’t be here, whining like a child. He should be out there fighting the girl who did this to him in the first place.

Realistically, Chase knows it wasn’t Carmen Sandiego who did this to him. His own fear has swallowed him up, and she cannot be blamed for that, nor can she be blamed for him getting dragged into the crossfire. He knew what he signed up for, though not exactly, and Chase would be stupid to think even for a second that nothing shitty would occur during his career.

But when all the mishaps, the embarrassment, the fuckups can be traced back to one person…

Well. It would be damn hard not to blame them.

Pain spikes behind his temple. Crying isn’t helping his headache, but his feet feel like lead, and he hasn’t had the will to move. He hasn’t had the will to move for most anything besides pissing in the last three days. It’s unlike him to miss work. To drink. To cry. 

Miss Argent never called. He assumed there was a reason for that.

He will not be missed. Has not been missed. Understandably so; he’s a ticking time bomb of condescension and ineptitude, a chaser of red flags, a bubbling engine in a sea of water. No one drowning ever rejects air, but Chase feels he’s going to be the first man to choke on an oxygen tank.

He must do everything the hard way, the Devineaux way, the Miss-Julia-Argent-Is-Frustrated-With-Him Way, the Fight-In-The-Parking-Lot Way, the You-Are-Too-Hard-On-Her, Chase, Way. She is a good partner. It is not her fault he cannot appreciate any good thing.

Chase sighs. His fingers shake as he chases his fear back with another drink, the cheap beer warming him up in a way the blankets can’t. It’s an internal warmth, one that makes the insides of his skin itch, and for a moment he imagines the burning fingers of Carmen Sandiego, the prints from where the slender fingers dig into his skin, and his body alights where he remembers finding bruises and—

He sucks in a shuddering breath. Everything revolves around Carmen, even when it is about him. He resents Carmen Sandiego for that, in some small way. 

When Chase finally closes his eyes, drunk and exhausted, the world is filtered red behind his eyelids from the light of the rising sun, and he filters a scream through his teeth.


End file.
